Pond Ripples
by Icarusy
Summary: Dumping ground for drabbles that I don't quite like. [angst] [romance] [humor]
1. Just Like This: 150 words

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**Just Like This (150 words)**

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It should be raining, but it's not. The sun is shining, the sky is blue and all that crap but at least the force of their fight had blown all the birds away.

He should be triumphant, and his brother hateful, but they aren't. They're closer together than they have been for years, and Sasuke's shock of red bleeds away and leaves them both vulnerable. He can't think and Sasuke can't believe, and they're both forgetting their lies and remembering too much.

There should be music- dramatic, electrifying, but there isn't. Forest rustles and shallow breaths will haunt his dreams, but he prays it'd never end. There are no unspoken words, and Sasuke's silent mouthings burn in his mind.

This isn't how it was supposed to end, but it will. Sasuke looks down at the hole in his chest, and Naruto wonders where the raindrops on his cheek came from.

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_and this is how it goes _

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Typical stuff, but hell, so be it. XP


	2. Imagery: 100 words

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**Imagery (100 words)**

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It was ironic, maybe, that Neji's life seemed to be composed almost solely of cruel metaphors and romantic symbolism when he saw everything in harsh black and white. Sometimes that hurt- being able to break down those whispery shades of grey into cold, hard distinctions of one, two, three- to see life without the poetry. There're never any maybes, any what-ifs, any _hopes_ of changing the future because genius eyes never lie and so only his weak cousin's could.

…

There're seven birds, and Neji prays that's enough to save him.

She finds nine, and smiles because they know she is.

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_where your eyes hold my lies_

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Hooray for overkilled symbolism.


	3. Pretty Maid: 200 words

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**Pretty Maid (200 words)**

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When Kakashi found his commander holding a child in his arms with that _look_ in his eyes, it was hard not to roll his eyes. Even with his current preoccupation, Itachi had an annoying habit of not missing anything around him.

"She's lost."

Kakashi watched slim fingers run through pink tresses and frowned. "She's not part of the mission. Leave her."

The Anbu ignored him and leaned in to breathe in the girl's hair, sharingan already activated to memorize the child's features. Kakashi shifted uneasily when one hand trailed down lightly from petal hair to wander over the girl's kimimo. "You're _thirteen_, Itachi."

Itachi only smiled faintly and tilted the girl's head so large bottle-green eyes met Kakashi's mismatched ones. "Pretty thing, isn't she?" he murmured, dark eyes flickering back and forth. Kakashi nodded grudgingly, the girl's vulnerability reminding him uncomfortably of Rin.

"Then I'll give her to my brother." Itachi was saying now. "Till she grows up."

The ash-haired boy frowned then. "She's not yours to give, Itachi."

The girl giggled quietly as Itachi tickled her side, then shyly wrapped small arms around the Anbu's neck to bury her face there. Itachi looked up again and smiled oddly. "So?"

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_pretty maids dancing in a row _

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Yeah,it's still me. My nick/alias has been changed, for various displeasing factors, though some remains of the originalstill lurk there if you squint a little.

Sorry- I uploaded this as a whole new story initially with another more twisted and :coughSmuttycough: ItaSaku in mind, but realized that I can't upload the second even though I prefer it. Thus I transfer it here. Damn you real-life stalkers. /rants>


	4. Afterlife Bets: Freestyle

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**Afterlife Bets**

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"Go Naruto! YOU CAN DO IT!"

There were, the blond man reflected, certain benefits of being dead and blissfully invisible to the known world. They were almost enough to make up for the bitter disadvantages and he prodded his surly afterlife-partner in the ribs in an effort to help enlightened him on this fact.

"You can yell too, you know. No need to keep up your reputation with _me._"

His grin received a pointedly blank stare in return. Shrugging, the blond joined his dark-haired friend in watching the two boys scuffle on the ground literally a few inches from their non-existent feet. He politely stepped back when one trashing hand went through both their legs, but his companion ignored the queasy feeling the motion would have evoked and continued to observe the friendly fight impassively.

Pride certainly runs in his family, he thought ruefully, noting his friend's wince as another limb passed through his leg. But not that he should speak.

"So… I'm betting on_ my_ brother again. How 'bout you?"

The non-too-subtle reminder of the last fight's outcome was not lost on the other. Itachi held back a scowl, ignored the past Hokage's wicked grin, and silently roared for Sasuke to kick some ass.

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_life starts at afterlife _

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Been a while since I've sat down and written anything; mostly because I've been very busy of late. That, and I've lost a certain zang for Naruto. But then again, what else is new?  
Many thanks for feedback, folks! Much appreciated. XD


	5. Doubles: Freestyle

**>>**

**Doubles (Freestyle)**

**>>**

Kakashi saw doubles in summer skies, in his comrades' smiles, in whispered words and absent gestures.

The shimmer of a parallel world- persuasive, deceptively delicate-straining at the edges of the gossamer fabric of reality and seeping doubts like pearls caught in spider webs. The straining of web, the dip of another gleaming alterverse caught—a girl's flirting smile became double-edged, her desire twisted into something ugly and greedy with beady eyes tearing him apart till he politely excused himself from yet another what-if date. The next day he would find her cold and hurt, and feign oblivion to her anger as he wondered how he could something so sweet could have repulsed him before.

But then again, Obito had probably only seen the sharingan's advantages when he sacrificed his clan's protocol and birthright to him. It'd saved his life countless times and others' thousands more, after all, till even his reputation as copy-master overshadowed his previously infamous Chidori. It was easy to forget the bloodlimit's high price in the face of death and Obito, for all his ideals-_ because_ of all his ideals- always listened to his heart rather than his head first. Kakashi fingered the battered steel covering his theft of a gift and thought with dark humor that he might understand why Uchiha Itachi played his mind games. His protégé never really had double layers weaving in and out of his face when almost every ugly and hateful thought was barely kept under the impassive mask which was really more embarrassingly transparent then he'll ever tell the boy. Sometimes, Kakashi thought that made him almost bearable for his callous honesty, in a world where the sharingan whispered double-dealers and measured power in every face it saw.

Underneath dark cloth, the gift/curse/legacy quieted and Kakashi learnt to see better than most with one eye. But occasionally, when the world was sane and even he craved nostalgia on quiet afternoons in too-familiar woods with the air thick with memories, he'd set his team some insignificant task and disappear in the brush to remember again.

The haitai would be freed for once, and after the brief dizzying experience of seeing the world with mismatched eyes- he breathed in the magnificence of just_ seeing _so much with two eyes-, he'd crotch above his rookie team and watch his _own_ teammates, his _first_ teammates come back to life.

And he'd pretend the ache in his chest was from holding his breath too long.

Because like the blood-eye tore through genjutsus, it also weaved its own special kind of illusion- one so tangible and surreal it could be even more real than reality itself. The pearls would tear through the web, and in the creamy mass split there would be a glimpse of Rin, the dark-headed flash of Obito and that identical fox smile.

Maybe, probably, most saw the next generation of Sanin- his own lone eye did. The irony and dark reminder of history repeating was almost grating for its lack of subtlety. But then Obito's eyes would remember itself in Sasuke's stubborn pride, would see only the memory of another determined medic in Sakura's healing, would watch that fox smile and blindingly blue eyes.

It would make him feel old.

It would make him remember.

Indulgent, foolish whimsical feelings of yet another veteran of course; of old aches and half-hearted dreams and more angst than he could be bothered with. He'd liked to believe he was just a simple, clinically efficient ninja with your typical weakness in adult books.

He'd like to believe that he could save Sasuke-- him, _him_ save Sasuke; of all the stupid, grand management decisions to set him as the sensei as if there was some sort of misguided bond through family tragedies and acid pasts--, that they would learn and grow gloriously as a family-the three of them, that there weren't be another war, that he was still young and mattered enough in this generation, that the cliché wouldn't happen. Not to this team; but that was a cliché too.

Kakashi Hatake would like to believe a lot of things, but his imagination was too well trained for that.

Under the trees, his sensei scrabbled with an irritable Obito and teased Rin for an eternity and nothing. Kakashi closed one eye, masked his past, and watched the future play out below him.

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_but there are no souls in body parts_

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**Allyluv!** I'm gratified by your comments, but I'm a little confused-- you mentioned my TsuOro drabble in the Fluff Lovers' Dreams review, and then you asked for a drabble. To clarify, does this mean you want a TsuOro FLUFF drabble? ;P No probs there of course (but it always pays to check with crack-pairings first, esp when the request apparent is vague.)


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